If you want a gateway album to discover jazz on tenor sax, you'll find pleasure in every bar on Michael Buckley's 'Ebb and Flow', released a few weeks ago on Livia Records.
Buckley is a simply extraordinary sax player - check out his work as a sideman with The Mingus Big Band as well as The Corrs, Donovan, and The Cranberries.
Based in Dublin, but absolutely of international stature, Buckley brings us a selection of nine original compositions with a delightful trio: Greg Felton (piano), Barry Donohue (bass) and Shane O’Donovan (drums).
This brings collaboration and empathy from all four musicians, with the tenor sax wending its way between them all. Eight of the nine tracks were composed by Buckley (the exception being May Story by Greg Felton) but there is a sense that rehearsals have taken the originals and developed them to fit the styles of each musician.
Production duties are equally collaborative, shared between Buckley and Livia Records' own Dermot Rogers. That relationship seems particularly appropriate, given that Buckley's father played with guitarist Louis Stewart, whose work is gradually being rediscovered courtesy of Rogers' efforts.
The entire album deserves a complete listen, but if required to save only one track from the storm as I step onto my desert island, it would be Chewie. Each instrument plays its role in the groove and Buckley's sax pours its way through the ebb and flow(!) of the seamless accompaniment that is really more than that.
While I always hesitate to describe an album as 'perfect', there is no doubt that Ebb and Flow provides a clear definition of tenor sax jazz for the 21st century.
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